


all i know is that with you there's something

by softtofustew



Category: Day6 (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Parallel Universes, Angst, Fluff, Implied Sexual Content, Jaehyungparkian, M/M, WOW I USE ACTUAL CAPITALISATION FOR ONCE, lmao lapslock who?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-25
Updated: 2019-12-25
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:08:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21957160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softtofustew/pseuds/softtofustew
Summary: the one where jae and brian meet, fall in love, and get torn apart by fate five times, over and over again, in different places and times. or the 5+1 jaebri au with a twist of familiarity and love spread over different universes.
Relationships: Kang Younghyun | Young K/Park Jaehyung | Jae
Comments: 12
Kudos: 102





	all i know is that with you there's something

**Author's Note:**

> typed this in two days, edited in one hour. i'm such a great author who plans ahead. n e ways, happy reading!

_[ one ]_

The squeak of worn-out sneakers against the floor resound throughout the court. Jae swipes a hand over his sweaty brow before raising his other hand high up in the air. “Bri! I’m open!” he yells.

He watches as his best friend swivels his head around, basketball in a firm grip in his hands. He struggles to block himself from an opposing player, and with a flick of his wrist, the ball is sent sailing over several heads, right into Jae’s hands. Jae flashes him a grin before turning and tearing down half the court. Their teammates, acting as the opposing team, are hot on his heels. Jae eyes Brian at the far end, and hurls the ball towards him. In a blink of an eye, Brian hurtles the ball right into the hoop, an easy three-pointer for the star captain of their school’s basketball team. A couple of the guys cheer as Brian whoops with joy. 

The sound of the whistle slices the lively atmosphere in half. All twenty of the players stand to attention and look at their coach. Coach Park drops the whistle, a grim line on his lips. He eventually lets his grin slip and says, “Good job today, boys. Really proud of y’all. Rest up tonight, and tomorrow, you all will sure as hell do incredibly against the Falcons.”

“You mean, we will _win_ against the Falcons,” Jackson chimes in, oozing confidence.

“Oi, Jackson, you said that the last time we played against them,” Sungjin chuckles, “ _and_ we landed in second place. You better not jinx our luck tomorrow.”

A chorus of chuckles erupt from the players, Jackson included. Their coach looks on, sighing deeply at their antics. “You all have improved tremendously over the past two months. I’m sure you guys will give it your all, tomorrow, yes?” He turns to Brian, who’s standing next to Jae near the front of the gang. “Any words, captain?” 

Brian shakes his head. His sweaty hair is matted across his forehead, and Jae has to hold himself back from brushing away the strands of hair tickling the boy’s eyebrows. “Not today. I’ll save my sappy words for tomorrow,” he laughs.

“Alright, then. Practice over! To the lockers, you lot; you smell like a goddamn zoo,” Coach Park barks at them. A cacophony starts up as conversation strikes up. In the locker room, the slam of lockers closing and the screech of the shower knobs reverberate loudly in Jae’s ears. He hurriedly jumps into the showers and lathers on some shampoo, before rinsing and changing within five minutes. By the time he’s out, Brian’s slipping on a faded graphic tee that jae’s probably seen him wear two dozen times already. He catches a sliver of tanned skin and taut muscle before disappearing under Brian’s shirt. “You ready to go?” he asks.

Jae shakes his head, snapping himself out of his daze. “Yeah, totally.” The both of them sling their duffel bags over their shoulders and wave goodbye to their teammates. As soon as they exit the locker room, Jae swings an arm around Brian’s shoulder and steers him towards the school entrance. “Alright, Bri, whereto for dinne-”

“-Younghyun-ssi!” The two boys turn their heads to see a girl run down the hallway towards them. Jae stares on silently as the girl stops before them and grins. “Hey, Younghyun-ssi, thanks for tutoring me during lunch; I aced my test!”

Brian chuckles. “No worries, Baram-ssi. Glad you did well on the test.”

The girl giggles, and oh no. Having been friends with Brian for the past ten years, Jae knows _exactly_ what this girl’s going to say next. “Do you want to grab dinner together or something? My treat, y’know, to thank you.”

… and Jae knows what Brian’s going to say next. “Sorry,” Brian says sheepishly. He runs a hand through his wet hair and smiles apologetically. “I’m, uh, not interested. And I’ve actually got plans right now.” He gestures towards Jae, who tries not to pull on his back-off-or-I’ll-tear-your-head-off face. 

“Ah,” Baram nods. Her face has visibly fallen, and Jae is a tiny bit guilty for feeling so gleeful. Only a little, though. “Well, I’ll see you around, Younghyun-ssi. And all the best against the Falcons tomorrow!” With that, she swivels around and hurries off down the hallway.

Jae nudges his friend’s side. “So, her, huh?” he teases lightly.

Brian rolls his eyes. “You know I don’t swing that way, dude,” he counters. They stroll out of the school gates and down the pavement. “Anyways. What do you want for dinner?”

Jae parts his lips to answer, but Brian beats him to it. “Wait, I know it. You want Mcdonald’s.”

Jae grins. He feels warmth spread across his chest. This is familiar, and Brian is familiar, as always. “As always.”

-

“Your stomach’s gonna burst through your shirt halfway through the game tomorrow,” Brian quips, as Jae shoves down another handful of fries. What can Jae say? Greasy food after two hours of gruelling practice cooks up quite the appetite for him. 

“Shut up, health nut,” Jae flicks Brian’s forehead with his clean hand. They’re sat opposite of each other, and Jae leans close to inspect Brian’s dinner. “One burger, no fries, and… the fuck is that?” he scrunches his nose up at the sight of the green shit floating around in brian’s bottle. 

“Well, it’s wheatgrass juice,” Brian replies nonchalantly, as if drinking wheatgrass were second nature. _Oh, god,_ Jae thinks. _This_ is the guy he’s liked for a solid five years? The guy who drinks _wheatgrass?_

“Dude, what the fuck,” Jae curses as Brian takes a swig of the drink. He watches the other’s adam’s apple bop up and down, until brian chokes and starts coughing. “See, that’s the unfortunate downside of being a health nut.”

Brian would’ve answered, but instead he keeps coughing and hacking away. Concerned, Jae stands from his seat and walks over to brian. “Bri, don’t scare me. Bri, you good?” he slaps Brian’s back, hard, and Brian coughs one last time. A strand of grass pops out onto the tray. The two of them simply stare at the grass, before exchanging looks and bursting into laughter. They laugh so hard that Jae almost topples over and sends his own tray flying, so hard that the cashier storms over to them and tells them to shut the hell up. They ignore her, instead stuffing their faces and dumping their trash. They’re still giggling by the time they walk out of the restaurant. And they howl like a pair of wolves as Brian empties his bottle onto a potted plant outside Mcdonald’s as a sign of gratitude towards said cashier. 

“I can’t believe you almost died because you couldn’t work the blender properly,” Jae snorts. His arm is still around Brian’s shoulder, and he subtly steers him closer to him. Their shirts brush against each other as they walk, and their hips bump together. “What even gave you the idea of drinking wheatgrass?”

“Y’know that one video of Adele eating wheatgrass at Jamba Juice?-”

“-what-”

“-so i got an idea to blend wheatgrass to make a healthy shake. Y’know, being captain and everything-”

“-so watching Adele eat wheatgrass inspired you to make a wheatgrass drink?” Jae blinks. “Do you understand how weird this entire situation sounds?”

“Shut up, dumbass,” Brian groans. Jae playfully jabs at his ribs with his elbow. Brian grumbles and nudges him back. It turns into a tickle fight, right there, in the middle of the pavement. A mum pushing a pram eyes them warily as she passes them, and an old man sat at a bench lowers his newspaper to raise an eyebrow at Jae and Brian, tickling each other’s sides. Brian practically bowls over a group of girls, and has to lean right into Jae to dodge them. His hair grazes Jae’s chin, and Jae tries not to take a not-so-subtle sniff of the other boy.

Eventually, they slowly approach Jae’s house. The worst thing about these walks home with Brian is that, well, they end. He kind of wants to continue walking with Brian around the neighbourhood, and do dumb stuff with him. Like that one time they egged Brian’s ex-boyfriend’s house, and narrowly missed the police. Or that one time they planted fake parking tickets on all of Jae’s neighbours’ cars, and they both got grounded for a solid two weeks. 

Jae would do that, over and over again, as long as it was with Brian.

As they halt in front of the looming gates, Brian grins at Jae. Behind Jae, the sun begins to dip below the horizon. Warm hues of red, yellow and orange drift and shine upon Brian’s face. His dark eyes glisten a light brown under the sunlight. His gentle smile is illuminated by the soft light, every curve and angle sharpened and highlighted. Jae’s eyes flick down to Brian’s lips, before flitting elsewhere. _A cycle,_ he thinks to himself. _It’s nothing but a cycle. Hope, then heartbreak, then hope again._

“Jae.” Brian’s still grinning at him. “Big game tomorrow, huh?”

“That’s all you’ve been rambling about the whole month,” Jae teases. 

Brian hums. “Well, rest up. And everything. Make sure you, uh, rest those muscles. And everything.”

Jae watches Brian’s eyes, how they wander down Jae’s face, settling on assets that Jae’s more than a little proud of. His nose. His jaw. His lips. “Mmhm,” Jae nods, clearly not listening to his friend. “You too.”

Brian nods jerkily. They linger there, for a while longer, until Jae breaks the silence. “You don’t happen to have any lucky charms, do you?”

“Lucky charms?”

Jae smiles. “Yeah. something that gives you luck before each game.”

Brian flushes. Pink dusts across his cheeks, the tips of his ears. “Nah, not really. So long as I get to see everyone pumped up and ready to go, it’s enough of a lucky charm to me,” he replies. 

Bullshit.

Jae leans closer, hands shoved into the pockets of his sweatpants. “Can I gift you a lucky charm, then?” he whispers - a secret between him, the flickering streetlight overhead, and the boy he loves.

Heat curls in crimson red and settles in the apples of Brian’s cheeks. “Mm,” he hums. 

Jae searches for confirmation in Brian’s eyes - a sign of some sort. It reminds him of the day Brian twisted his ankle, and Jae had looked into his eyes and asked, “You good, Bri?” or the day Brian gifted him Jae’s dream guitar for his seventeenth birthday, and Jae had looked into his eyes and asked, “You sure i can accept this, dude?” 

This time, it’s the same, but different all the same. _Maybe the cycle can be broken,_ Jae wishes, before closing the gap between them.

When their lips meet, Jae hesitantly closes his eyes, unsure of what to do. In an instance, he feels a hand curl around the back of his neck and tug him closer. His heart leaps to his throat when Brian kisses back, right there, hand on his neck, hand on his cheek. Their lips meet, and slot together, a salvation from desperation and crushed dreams. Jae groans and presses back harder, his hands running up Brian’s cheeks, down to his broad shoulders. He can barely believe it. _I’m kissing the boy I love._

When they part, they blink silently at each other. Brian cracks a shy smile and leans in once more. Brian slowly presses Jae against the gate, and the metal digs into Jae’s back, but Jae, for once, does not fucking care, not when his best friend is kissing him slowly, sweetly. Not when Brian’s hand slips under his shirt and splays across his abdomen. Jae whines and leans impossibly closer into Brian’s kiss, Brian’s hold. 

Brian leans back, and Jae desperately chases after the taste of him on his lips. “Not when your parents are literally ten metres away from us,” he argues, when Jae protests. Jae finds the loss of warmth especially hard to swallow, but his heart thumps a little harder when Brian drops a kiss on his cheek. “And, Jae?”

“Hm?”

Brian turns, but his head tips back to Jae. He grins. “That’s probably the best lucky charm i’ve gotten, ever.”

Jae grins back. “That’s ‘cause you’re my lucky charm, too.”

And with that, the cycle is broken. Hope, heartbreak and… happiness. But as they turn their backs on each other and walk their separate ways, perhaps fate turns their back on them both. Perhaps fate takes the broken cycle in their hands, and mends it, and with a flick of their wrist, sends it spinning again - and not for the last time.

-

_[ two ]_

_Thump._ A stack of papers land unceremoniously right onto Brian’s cluttered desk. “Get these done by 7p.m., and make sure they’re on my desk, filed and stapled. Chop chop!” his manager barks, before turning on his heel and striding off. Brian groans and slams his head against the top of the pages in agony.

At the next cubicle over, Jae peers over his desk and whistles lowly. “That’s one hell of a job for you, Bri,” Jae comments lightly. Like the very polite, very civilised thirty-two-year-old he is, Brian shoves the middle finger at Jae, who laughs heartily and returns to his work. Brian catches the slightest bit of milky skin behind Jae’s collar as the man begins to click away at his computer. Brian shakes his head, sighing as he continues drilling his way through his workload.

After spending four hours at his desk, arranging the documents and accounts, stapling and filing them away, Brian whines as he tries to stand up. He stumbles, and if it were not for Jae walking back to his seat at that exact moment, Brian would’ve ended up on the carpeted floor. 

“Woah, dude, careful there,” Jae laughs, his hand reaching out to steady Brian’s hips. Brian flushes the instance Jae’s fingers brush against his side. He trips a little before balancing himself again. When he turns around, Jae props his glasses higher up the slope of his nose. “What? I got coffee on my lips or something?”

Which only makes Brian’s eyes turn to his lips. “N-no,” he blurts out. After a moment of awkward silence, Brian hurriedly scoops up the files on the desk into his arms. “I’ll just, y’know, get these on manager-nim’s table, and everything. Haha.”

“I should help you,” Jae offers, and before Brian can protest, the other man’s already plucked up the ring files at the very top of the stack. “You’ve been slaving over this work for forever, the least I can do is help you carry them.”

“Thanks,” Brian nods. They make their way out of the office and down the corridor, to the manager’s office. They knock gently on the door, but when silence responds, Brian twists the doorknob to reveal an empty room. 

Both of them place the files down on the desk, and Brian hurriedly scribble a quick note for his manager. “Alright, job’s done, finally,” Brian grumbles, slapping the sticky note onto the cover of the file with a huff. As he turns around, he almost bumps against Jae leaning against the doorframe. “Oh, shit, sorry!”

“Nah, no worries,” Jae laughs. He tilts his head to the side prettily, his little silver hoop earrings adorning his ears. “Hey, it’s a Friday night. Wanna go out with me and the rest of the gang?”

Brian knows a little about the faculty’s wild Friday night hangouts, has heard from the gossiping accounting ladies always hogging the coffee machine. Has heard of how Jae gets around sometimes, fools a bit, but never has any strings attached. Brian could be toeing a very, very dangerous line, especially since he’s so taken by the man before him right now. “Well… It’s not really my thing,” he says slowly. “I’ve only been here for, what, four months? And I’m not a huge fan of going out. I barely know anyone.”

“Anyone else but your cubicle-mate?” Jae chuckles. He smooths down Brian’s collar with a deft finger, before gazing right at Brian in the eye. “C’mon, it’ll be fun. Kinda wanna see the fun side of you when you’re drunk, too.”

Brian bites down on his lower lip. _You will not succumb to this,_ he chastises himself. _You will not be bamboozled by Park Jaehyung, no matter how funny, or attractive, or carefree, or friendly he is-_

-

An hour later, Brian finds himself seated across from Jae, sandwiched between two of his colleagues clinking their beers right over his front. _So much for not being bamboozled,_ he thinks to himself, before bringing the shot glass to his lips.

The atmosphere is electric. The restaurant is small, far too compact to squeeze in fifteen workers under the finance department, but somehow they make do. Soju and beer bottles are passed around easily, laughter is exchanged, and gossiping is heard in the loudest of whispers. 

Brian cowers in his winter coat, unwilling to peel it off of him despite how stuffy the restaurant is. He looks down at his shot glass miserably, wondering why he’d got himself caught in this situation. 

“Yo, Bri.” at the sound of his name on Jae’s tongue, Brian peers up to see Jae pouring himself another shot. “Loosen up, kid. You look like a deer caught in the headlights.”

“Maybe I am,” he responds, before holding his glass out. The liquid pours from the bottle, spilling a little due to Jae’s haziness, and Brian brings the glass to his lips again. From his peripheral vision, he can see Jae eyeing him surreptitiously, even whilst holding a conversation with Wonpil by his side. When he lowers his glass, his eyes remain fixated on Jae’s, how they slide over to Brian. The upward quirk of the corner of his lips confirms his suspicions.

Once Brian gradually settles in, he realises his colleagues aren’t as asshat as they usually are at work (then again, their manager does do quite the number on their workload. Whoever could smile through _that_ pain is probably a godsent). As the aroma of grilled beef settles in the air, he begins to talk comfortably with Chan, who’s sat beside him, and Dowoon, who’s a few seats over. The _chink!_ of shot glasses cut through the air, accompanied by the sizzling of the meat. Hours tick by, and before Brian realises it’s already 11p.m. 

Those rumours spread around the office were true, though. The synergy and bluster of his colleagues is at an all-time high, everyone drunkenly laughing at each other’s jokes in between swigs of alcohol. Brian can only imagine what it’d be like to spectate a Friday hangout on pay day.

Brian fishes for his pocket and retrieves a few thousand won bills from his wallet, before slapping them onto the receipt. “I’ll head off first,” he announces, and there’s a flurry of waves and “Bye, Younghyunnie ah!”s as Brian stumbles to his feet. He slips on his work shoes and staggers out of the door. He hadn’t drunk very much, but he’s a bit of a lightweight. His head is still quite sharp, but his limbs don’t seem to be cooperating with his brain very much.

As soon as Brian’s out the door, the silver bells overhead the entrance tinkle again. “Heading home?” Stunned, Brian turns to see Jae, cheeks flushed and smile glowing. Brian doesn’t think he’s ever seen someone so drunk, yet so gorgeous, like Jae before.

“Yeah,” he replies, nodding. Jae grins and loops an arm around his shoulder, skin brushing the nape of his neck. In a flash, Brian feels a shot of adrenaline spike up his spine, and he gasps.

“You good?” Jae asks, observing Brian’s face. “You look like you just saw a ghost.”

_That’s ‘cause you’re my lucky charm too._

“Bri, talk to me.” Jae’s voice yanks Brian out of his thoughts. His head spins violently as he narrows his eyes at Jae. The voice in his head is unmistakably Jae’s, but… since when did he ever talk about lucky charms of all things? “You good, dude? Had too much to drink?”

“Maybe…” Brian blinks, staring down at his shoes. He swallows his nerves as they continue to walk down the dimly lit pavement. With Jae’s weight leaning against his, with Jae’s arm around his shoulder, everything feels so _deja vu_ … but it isn’t.

They pause at the bus stop, and Jae plops down onto the vacant bench with a huff. “My brain fucking hurts,” Jae groans, raising an arm over his eyes. 

Brian chuckles as he seats himself beside his colleague. “Maybe you just had too much to drink,” he replies casually.

“Shut up, you sober nut,” Jae deadpans.

_Shut up, health nut._

Brian gulps. “Um… Jae-hyu-”

“-no formalities while I’m drunk, please,” Jae grumbles. “I sound so fucking _old_.”

“Alright, got it,” Brian says, smothering his grin. “Have we met before? Like, before I was hired?”

Jae’s arm falls to his side, and he looks at Brian forlornly. “What’s with the sudden question?” he asks. Still, he mulls over it for a moment, before shaking his head. His greasy hair bounces with every movement, and Brian has to stop himself from carding his fingers through the man’s blonde-dyed hair, the dark roots peeking out signifying a long overdue re-dye. “I don’t think so? I only really met you at the office. Nothing special. Just thought you looked hot.”

Brian chokes on his breath. “You thought i looked h-hot?” he splutters.

Jae shrugs, as if it were the most normal thing to say. “Yeah, duh, have you looked at yourself?” His eyes drag down Brian’s body, from head to toe, at an excruciatingly slow pace. “I mean, you’ve got the eyes, the nose, the lips, the jawline, the shoulders, the body. Everything.” he grins lazily at brian. “If I weren’t your cubicle-mate, I’d kiss you on the spot.”

 _This isn’t happening,_ he admonishes himself. _This is just a dream, and you will wake up, and none of this would have happened._

The problem: Jae’s inching closer and closer to Brian, his fingers tapping against Brian’s chin now. “You’re so lucky I like you,” Jae breathes. “Or else I’d be really, really Jae-lous of your looks. Geddit? Jae-lous, like jealous, but switch the ‘a’ and ‘e’ around.”

“O-okay,” Brian says shakily. The frames of Jae’s glasses bonk against his nose, and Brian can only sit there, frozen in place. “C-cool. Um, i like you too. Even though we don’t talk that much. I mean, we do, and I really enjoy talking to you. Uh.” He blinks at Jae. “You’re kinda really close to me.”

Jae hums. “We should do something about that,” he murmurs. 

Brian practically keels right over. “Yup,” he replies back.

Jae laughs. “You’re lucky you’re cute,” is all he says before his lips collide messily with Brian’s. The taste of alcohol and fried chicken and the sour mint Jae keeps in his shirt pocket spill into Brian’s mouth in an explosion of colours. His eyelashes flutter before his eyelids slide shut. In this moment, he’s been lured closer to Jae, a moth drawn to a flame. His hands shakily cup Jae’s cheeks as their kiss deepens. He can’t piece together the last time he’d ever kissed anyone else - perhaps a high school fleeting romance? Nothing, and absolutely _nothing_ , can ever compete with his friend and colleague, _the_ Park Jaehyung, kissing the daylight right out of him.

When they pull back, the flickering streetlights cast shadows upon Jae’s chiseled face, from his gorgeous eyes to his pursed lips. Jae smiles dorkily, his glasses askew on his face. “Say… you have any Saturday plans tomorrow?”

Brian shakes his head, unsure of where this is heading.

Before Jae speaks, the bus squeaks to a halt before them. Jae’s eyes flit from the bus, back to Brian. A wicked grin forms on his face. “I’d be honoured if we took this further in my humble dwelling,” he says, his voice low and dangerous. It sends a shiver down Brian’s spine.

“You’re drunk,” he argues.

Jae laughs. “I’m actually not that drunk,” he says, his voice suddenly stable. Brian rolls his eyes. Of course he had to fuck around with Brian like that. “And, Bri?” Brian’s eyes lock onto Jae’s. “I know we only really talk in between, y’know, lunch breaks and suffering under manager-nim-”

_-HONK HONK!_

“But,” Jae continues. “I really like you. All of you. Ever since you walked into the office with that ridiculously hideous firetruck red tie.”

Brian blushes. “I didn’t realise ties had some sort of etiquette,” he mumbles.

The bus driver punches the honk again. “Sorry if that sounded, y’know, rushed and half-assed.”

“No, no, it’s fine,” Brian says. He bites down on his lower lip. “I-I like you, too.”

“Oh, thank _goodness_ ,” Jae heaves. “Love that for us. Now c’mon, before we get fined by this bus lady.”

And when they collapse into the bus seats and kiss long and slow, when they stumble into Jae’s apartment room and press each other against the mattress, when they rid of every space between them and their breaths begin to slow, the cycle breaks again, as it did before. 

But fate is not by their side this time, either. Fate takes the cycle in its broken pieces, mends it again, and the cycle begins once again, spinning faster and faster. Hope, and heartbreak, and happiness, and heartbreak.

-

_[ three ]_

“Take one every morning,” the doctor drones. He passes Lieutenant Younghyun a small bottle of orange pills. He retrieves another small bottle, this one with purple pills. “And two of these every day, once in the morning, and once at night.”

Captain Jae, gold-star ace fighter of the First Alliance, absolute beast sniper of the galaxies, watches on as his friend, his companion, struggle to sit up and take the bottles from the doctor. Swathed in white blankets, Jae almost can’t remember the bandage wrapped firmly around the other’s torso. Almost. Because such is life, and reality is the cruelest, harshest thing to exist, without really existing at all.

“Thank you, Doc,” Younghyun says, flashing a strained smile. As he begins to shuffle off the bed, Jae takes the bottles from his hand and dumps them into Younghyun’s duffel bag. Jae then turns his attention back to the lieutenant, and gently helps him to his feet. Younghyun stumbles a little, displaced from walking ever since his injury a month ago. 

Jae remembers the day like the back of his palm. In the arduous fight against the Right-Wing Resistance, he hadn’t taken notice of his companion, shot right in the abdomen by a pesky fighter wing hidden out of sight by a blocking meteor. He’d remembered the crackly feed sputtering through his headphones, the dread in his heart plummeting the depths of the world when he saw the blank look on his second-in-command’s face.

Why hadn’t he seen it coming? The lieutenant was a ultimate target, in fact - renowned across five galaxies for his brilliant fighting, his consistent aim, his smooth hyper-jumps. Everyone wanted a piece of him - literally. Jae saw red the moment he laid eyes on the perpetrator, and never had he screamed so hard and so broken in his life.

Now, a month later, he helps Younghyun to his feet and slings his duffel bag over his shoulder. He notices Younghyun protesting, but he clicks his tongue. “You just got out of your bed after a whole four weeks, kid,” he sniffs. “You should practise walking first.”

And yet, despite everything, despite Jae not putting his crew members first, despite Jae not looking out for his best friend and companion, Younghyun sighs and smiles softly at Jae. “As you wish, Cap.”

Jae’s shoulders tense up at the title. “You know you don’t have to call me that outside of work, Younghyun,” he reminds.

Younghyun nods. “As you wish, Jae.”

And Jae hates it. Hates that Younghyun doesn’t hate him for what he did. Hates that Younghyun is still so kind-hearted, so polite, and so forgiving. Jae’s not sure if he wants to bash the guy’s head against a wall or cry into his arms. 

They approach the lifts, and Jae punches the down button. “I’m taking you back to your quarters,” he says. “I’ll order some dinner for you; hospital food can suck my dick.”

Younghyun hums. “It is pretty bad,” he notes.

“Do they not realise that people die in space every few hours?” Jae seethes. “The least they could do is have some decent food.”

The doors rumble open, and Jae sticks his foot out so Younghyun can shuffle in slowly. He gives Jae a grin, before pressing on the ground floor button. “Thanks,” he says cheerily, before humming to himself.

Jae stares at the swoop of Younghyun’s nose, down to his sharp chin, and down to the faded sweatshirt he’d brought for Younghyun to wear. His heart drops at the sight of the bulky bandage making his shirt stick out a little. Jae peels his eyes away and instead gazes down at the lift floor.

Eventually, in this silence, the doors open again. Jae hails a taxi speeder for the Hub, where the government workers lived together in their quarters. They don’t exchange a word throughout the ride, what with Younghyun gazing out the window and Jae meddling with his fingers, unsure of what to say. _Sorry I didn’t look out for you? Sorry you almost died? Thank goodness the fucking Resistance kid’s aim was so shit?_

After a few minutes, they pull up at the entrance of the Hub. Jae helps a wincing Younghyun out of the taxi, hands the driver the cash and supports him up the stairs. As they pass the main wing, several people wave at them, some saying, “Get well soon, Lieutenant!” and “We miss you, Lieutenant!” Jae ignores any form of greeting towards him, instead looping an arm around Younghyun’s shoulder and pulling him closer.

Something flashes in his head, and Jae hisses.

Younghyun jumps a little in place. “You okay, Jae?” he asks in a hushed voice.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Jae fibs. He blinks. The burst of colours in his head had revealed the both of them, in uniforms as teenagers, laughing and stuffing their faces; the both of them, dressed in office, kissing somewhere on a seat. He shakes the memory out of his head, his hands jittery as they curl around Younghyun’s shirt.

They make it to Younghyun’s dorms, and Jae helps him open the door. Younghyun inhales deeply as they walk into the room. “Gosh, it smells like home,” he swoons.

“It smells like shit, because your dirty clothes are all over the floor,” Jae sticks a tongue out. Younghyun laughs and slaps the captain’s back. For someone who’d been confined to a bed for four weeks, he can still pack a punch, and Jae tries to laugh the pain off. 

After the clothes are thrown lazily into the wash, and after Jae orders them some Chinese takeout, and after they’re settled on the couch catching up with Younghyun’s all-time favourite TV show, ‘Best Part’, while fighting over the last dumpling, Jae musters his courage to ask the questions on the tip of his tongue.

“Younghyun,” Jae murmurs. He places the takeout box onto the coffee table and glances at Younghyun. Confused, the latter does the same. “Do you hate me?”

Younghyun’s eyes widen, and he spits and sputters a few times, like a cranky old machine gearing back to life, and finally blurts out, “Why would you think such a thing, Jae?”

“Because you almost died because of me?” Jae cries. He’s not sure why he’s raised his voice, but every part of him dies inside when he sees Brian’s smile drop off of his face. “Because I was supposed to look out for every one of you, and I let you, my second-in-command, just open right there on the battlefield? Because I almost had to see my best friend die like that?”

“Hey, hey,” Younghyun turns to face Jae, and places a warm hand on his shoulder. “Look, Jae. Look at me.”

A tear spills out of the corner of Jae’s eye as he turns. Younghyun gazes at him, at his eyes and nose and chin. “You did nothing wrong, hear me? Absolutely nothing. No one saw it coming. Not even myself. And what’s in the past, stays in the past. I don’t, and could never, hate you, ever. Seriously.” 

Jae sniffs. “I hate myself for seeing you suffer like that.”

“For what?” Younghyun asks incredulously. “I’m alive and well, aren’t I? I’m watching Kim Wonpil and Park Sungjin duel it out on-screen over who’s the better actor, right? Y’know, Jae, it pains me to know that you’re putting the blame on yourself, when you don’t need to.”

All the weight seems to lift from his shoulders. Jae sighs shakily and leans forward, to bury his face into Younghyun’s sweatshirt. He smells like the hospital, but he also smells like cheap axe spray and Chinese food and, well. Home. He’s Jae’s home, has always been, and always will be. 

Younghyun places his other palm on Jae’s back, and smooths his shirt down gently. Everything about Younghyun is perfect: his energy, his words, his gestures, his voice, his heart. Everything about Younghyun is perfect, and upsettingly not Jae’s. Jae relishes in the moment, his hands curling into the fabric of Younghyun’s shirt, his eyes closed as he drowns in his best friend, the one he’s loved for so, so long.

“Jae.”

“Hm?”

Younghyun pats Jae’s back, a sign for him to lift his head. Dazed, Jae peels his eyes open to look at Younghyun. The lieutenant licks his dry lips, mulling over his words. “Thank you,” he finally says. “For taking care of me for the past month.”

“It’s really nothing-”

“-that’s not all,” Younghyun cuts him off, but with a gentle smile. “In my time confined to a bed and no cable TV, I realised a lot of things. Things that I don’t think of when I dive head-first into a battle, or when I fight recklessly out in the open, or when… or when I come over to your quarters sometimes when the thunder rumbles too loud.”

Jae gulps down his nerves.

“And I realised that I have to say it now, because who knows where I will be tomorrow, or the next battle-”

“-don’t say it like that,” Jae protests.

Younghyun strokes Jae’s hair with a careless hand, his eyes softening. “Of course. But I realised I have to say it now, before it’s too late, before I don’t have the opportunity to say it anymore: I love you, Jae. I really do.”

Jae blinks. He swallows, hard. “You’re serious?”

“How can I joke about loving you?” Younghyun laughs dryly. His hand splays itself across Jae’s cheek, his fingers tickling the side of his nose. “I feel that fate gave me a chance, y’know? To tell you how I feel. I think luck was by my side that day weeks ago. I’m lucky enough to be able to tell you this after all this time.”

_That’s probably the best lucky charm I’ve gotten, ever._

The voice is quiet, so quiet Jae almost doesn’t hear it. It is unmistakably Younghyun’s voice, though, and Jae wonders where it could ever have come from. But as the lieutenant pitches his face closer, all thoughts fly right out of Jae’s mind. “Fuck, Younghyun,” Jae whispers. “I love you so damn much-”

He doesn’t even finish his sentence, that asshole, before Younghyun leans over to kiss him. Their kiss is nothing innocent, nothing tame - only desperation and want as their hands trace the corners of their faces. Everything burns alive, alive, alive as the thought strikes the both of them at the same time: _We’re alive, and that’s all that matters._

Jae tumbles forward, trapping Younghyun under his body. “Shit, shit, your wound,” Jae winces, supporting himself up on his elbows. The couch is almost too small to fit the both of them, but Younghyun props himself up to fling the throw pillows onto the floor carelessly, without a damn for anything or anybody else, but Jae. 

“Don’t worry about that,” Younghyun says. He leans closer to Jae, his lips nicking the shell of his ear. “I only want you worrying about this,” he purrs into his ear.

Before Jae can ask, “About what?”, Younghyun takes Jae’s hand in his and guides it slowly down his body, past his chest, past his abdomen, before stopping right over the waistband of his sweats. Jae almost keels right over when he feels Younghyun jerking up against his hand. “Here,” he whispers.

Jae laughs awkwardly, his cheeks flushing red. “Fuck, Younghyun, you can’t just _do_ that,” he whines.

Younghyun chuckles and kisses him again. “I definitely can, and I will,” he says against their lips. Their tongues eventually find each other, slipping into each other’s mouths. Jae groans into the kiss, spit beginning to spill past the corners of his lips. It’s messy, uncoordinated, and if it were a practice run before a major battle, Jae would’ve thrown a fit right in open space. Right now, though, his hand cups Younghyun’s cheek, the other sliding the waistband of his pants down, past his hips, revealing… star-patterned boxers. Glow-in-the-dark, star-patterned boxers.

As Jae erupts into a bout of giggles, Younghyun huffs, annoyed. “I ran out of underwear, okay?” he argues. “And you know how Dowoon loves handing out space-related clothes as cheap birthday gifts!”

“Sure, sure, my love,” Jae snickers. Their laughter fades away when Jae’s hand presses against Younghyun through the fabric of his boxers, and Younghyun sighs. Jae’s heart thumps harder against his chest, as his fingers ghost over the hem of his boxers. “Are you sure you want to…?”

“Jae,” Younghyun gripes. “I may have a gunshot wound on my stomach, but is that gonna stop me from getting some dick love from you? No, and absolutely no.”

“Dick love,” Jae snorts, but the second he pulls the other’s boxers down, all that follows is silence.

There are moments between them kissing, between them getting each other off, between them whispering against each other’s lips, between them spilling into each other’s love so honest and open. And when they kiss each other good night and curl up in each other’s love, the cycle is broken again. Hope, heartbreak, happiness. 

Yet again, fate does not wish to aid them, does not wish to fuel the fire of their love. Instead, fate takes the broken cycle in their arms, mends it again, and sends it running once more, in yet another place, another time.

-

_[ four ]_

“Jae!”

The summer breeze blows across the grassy fields. The willow trees slant downwards with the rhythm of the wind, slow and stately, as if beckoning Younghyun closer to the woods. Yellow daffodils peak out of wild bushes, accompanying him on his journey up the hill. From here, if Younghyun looked back, he’d see the entire town below him, spread across him in rows: the paddy fields, the cottages, the streets, the carts and the horses and the villagers. 

But Younghyun goes on forth, his eyes searching for a sign of the boy in the woods. “Jae!” he cries again. Today, the weather is at an all-time high - he’s eager to bring Jae out of the woods to lay across the grassy meadows, with the sound of the sheep bleating in the near distance. “Jae, I’m here! Come on out!”

As the sun rises higher in the sky, the sweat begins to pour from Younghyun’s scalp. He runs the last few steps to the edge of the forest, and peers past the thicket of trees. “Yoohoo!” he shouts. “Hellooooo? Anyone hoooome?”

A few seconds tick by. Before Younghyun shouts for Jae again, a silvery, translucent orb appears from behind a tree trunk, and floats closer to Younghyun. The orb bumps into Younghyun’s forehead, but before Younghyun can protest, a white light glows strongly in the darkness of the woods, and Jae materialises before his very eyes, dressed in his usually white shirt and white pants, and barefoot.

“Why’d you take so long?” Jae whines, and nudges his friend. The centremost of his irises glitters a shimmering silver.

Younghyun rolls his eyes, before thrusting out a pair of white slip-on shoes. “I had to secretly buy them at the store, and run out before that nosy shopkeeper asked why,” he explains.

He watches how Jae’s eyes light up, how the corners of Jae’s lips curve upwards into a dazzling smile. “Thank you,” he breathes. He delicately plucks the shoes from Younghyun’s hand and places them on the grass. Younghyun beams as the forest spirit slips on the shoes easily. 

Jae grins, admiring the shoes. “They’re perfect,” he whispers, and without warning, drops a tender kiss on the village boy’s cheek. “Thank you.”

Younghyun flushes, and prays the pink colour doesn’t appear on his cheeks. “It’s my pleasure,” he replies curtly. He brushes the thought of the kiss off of his mind and instead takes upon the spirit’s hand. “C’mon, it’s the perfect weather to lie on the grass today! Let’s go.”

Jae nods, and smiles as the village boy takes the forest spirit away to a corner tucked away in the meadow, sheltering the both of them from the reality of the day, cocooning them in a world of their own, as it always has been for a long while now.

-

“That one looks like a horse,” Younghyun points at the cloud drifting past the sky, his eyes narrowing at the dollop of white in the bright blue sky. “It kinda has a big butt, though.”

Jae giggles. He curls up closer by Younghyun’s side, his white hair tickling Younghyun’s cheek, but the village boy doesn’t protest. The warmth emanating from Jae spreads and sinks deep into Younghyun’s bones. “That one looks like a sheep,” Jae comments softly.

A sheep in the distance bleats in response, and the two boys laugh.

Ever since Younghyun had gone exploring the forest two years ago, both of them had hit it off so well, despite how Jae had scared the living daylights right out of Younghyun when he’d appeared from a floating white blob. Younghyun learned that the forest spirits are dying, with every few trees the villagers cut down in the forest. The spirits protect the forest, maintain the balance of the flora and forest critters, but cannot, and will not, fight against human nature and greed.

Younghyun tilts his head to watch Jae. The forest spirit remains transfixed by the passing clouds, oblivious to Younghyun admiring him, his face, his entire being. He feels so lucky to have met Jae, to have met a boy who loves cloud-gazing and playing in the woods and talking just as much as Younghyun does. The other village boys play rough, and the first football match Younghyun had joined in with them turned out to be his last. He never fit in with the other kids, but with Jae, he’s found a home he can’t seem to tear himself away from.

Lucky, that’s what he is.

_I’m lucky enough to be able to tell you this after all this time._

He blinks. The words appear in his head in a blur, before dissipating into thin air. As if he’d said those words before, heard those words before. His eyes flit back to Jae, and to his surprise, Jae’s looking back at him, too.

_That’s ‘cause you’re my lucky charm, too._

Younghyun shivers, and Jae takes it as a sign that he’s cold. He leans closer, his body pressed up against Younghyun’s, his lips mere centimetres away from his own. 

Younghyun’s heart has never beat so fast before.

“Jae…” Younghyun exhales. His mind is a mess of words, a jumble, a tangle of letters. And yet, the three words sit right there, on his lips, waiting to be said. “I like you.”

Jae props himself up on his elbows, and cocks his head to the side cutely. “What do you mean?”

Younghyun supports himself up, too, so they’re eye-to-eye. “Well…” his voice trails off, thinking over how to explain this. “It means that, well, I feel this warm feeling in my chest when I see you. When I’m with you, I want to be here forever. When I leave you, I feel like running back to you. It hurts to see you sad, and it makes me glad when you’re smiling.”

“Oh!” Jae nods, understanding, and Younghyun can’t imagine how one boy can be so adorable, so innocent and pure. “Oh, well then! That means I like you, too.”

Younghyun’s heart begs to burst right out of his chest. “You do?”

Jae grins. “Yeah,” he says. He leans close, eyes locked on Younghyun’s. “I like you a lot, Younghyun ah.”

Younghyun grins. He pitches forward and embraces Jae tightly. They flop back onto the grass and stay there in each other’s arms. Their chests brush against each other, and Younghyun is surprised to hear Jae’s heart beating as fast as his own, as recklessly as his own. “I didn’t know spirits had a heart,” he murmurs into Jae’s ear.

Jae giggles, and it’s the warmest feeling Younghyun has ever felt. “And now you know,” he simply replies, before closing his eyes and allowing him to rest his love on Younghyun’s shoulder, to the sounds of the breeze and the rustling leaves, to the sound of Younghyun’s steady breaths against his own ears.

The cycle is broken. And fate all but turns a deaf ear upon the two boys, the village boy and the forest spirit. Instead, fate retrieves the cycle, mends it, spins it, and turns the story around for the two boys, broken apart yet again into another place, another time.

-

_[ five ]_

The rain pelts down, hard, against the two bodies. Somewhere in the distance, police sirens wail in the thunderous storm. Curled up in a dark alley, in between two abandoned shop lots, are two boys, shivering in the cold rain.

“Brian,” Jae whispers. “Brian, stop it. Look at me.”

Brian inhales, exhales, inhales, exhales. Every breath he takes is harsh and jagged, like a hand of a clock jittering and stuttering with every tick of a second. “Don’t,” he breathes shakily. “Don’t, Jae, don’t come close to me.”

“Brian,” Jae protests, and a hand lingers over his shoulder. To his shock, Brian slaps the hand away with the back of his palm.

“I said don’t come close to me!” Brian shrieks at him. His voice breaks away at the edges, his eyes livid with anger, frustration. Thunder claps over their heads once again, as Brian curls himself up into a ball and begins sobbing. “Don’t come close to me,” he says, weakly.

Jae’s eyes land on the road a distance away. On the street, a man lays dead. Within seconds, he’s being zipped up in a bag and carried away. Jae remains apprehensive, until he knows for sure that every police car has left the vicinity. As soon as the sirens fade into the night, Jae turns his attention back to Brian. 

“Brian, it’s not your fault-”

“-of course it’s my fucking fault!” Brian screams at him. He cries harder, the raindrops mixing with his endless tears. “I killed him, Jae, I killed him!”

“Out of self-defence,” Jae retorts. “If you hadn’t protected himself, he would’ve killed you.”

“Jae, you don’t _get_ it,” Brian says. “I’m a walking Grim Reaper. I kill everything and everyone I touch. You don’t get to tell me how to feel, or how to act, because you don’t fucking understand!”

A roar of thunder reverberates throughout the city. A blanket of tension has fallen over the two boys, neither able to slice it into half. The rain begins to pound down harder on them both, and yet the silence between them is piercing. Jae glances down at his hands, his fingers, wet in the rain. 

He remembers the blankness in the man’s eyes when Brian pressed down against him, pinning him to the floor. He remembers the pain in Brian’s eyes, the pain in Brian’s voice when he screamed, wrecked with pain and agony. He remembers Brian remembers Brian storming out of the apartment, remembers Brian screaming into the storm, how broken he had felt and looked.

After what feels like a wretched hour in the rain, Jae taps Brian’s shoulder. “Bri,” he whispers. “Brian, c’mon, you’re going to get a cold.”

“Then let it be,” Brian sniffs. “I might as well. It’s the least of my problems.”

“Brian.”

Eventually, after much gentle coaxing and pleading, Jae beckons Brian onto a bus, where the bus driver eyes the two drenched boys warily but doesn’t say a word when she catches the look on the boys’ faces. They sit down together, arm-to-arm, staring wordlessly out of the window. Jae looks at Brian, remembers the smile on his lips a few hours ago as they bought ice cream together, remembers the laugh on his lips as Jae clumsily dropped his ice cream cone to the pavement.

_You did nothing wrong, hear me? Absolutely nothing._

The voice in his head appears again. It’s been happening for a while now, these voices. This one is unmistakably Brian’s again, as it always has been. He wonders if Brian was really whispering those words right into his ear.

He’s pulled out of his thoughts as the bus squeaks to a halt. Jae ushers Brian down the bus, and into Jae’s apartment. They ride the lift in silence up to Jae’s three-room apartment, where Jae hands Brian some clothes and sets the kettle to boil.

When Brian reappears, he’s swallowed by the Spiderman sweater he has on. On another day, Jae would’ve laughed at him in his clothes. On another day, Brian would’ve whined and aimed a pillow at his head. Now, they stand in silence, staring at each other. 

Finally, Brian parts his lips. “You should get dried,” he whispers.

Jae smiles sadly. “I’ll brew us some tea first.”

When the tea is poured into two mugs, Jae slides one across the kitchen island to Brian. Jae takes up his mug, sips a little, notices how Brian doesn’t touch his drink. Jae lowers his mug. “Brian, drink up-”

“-I hate myself,” he spits. Brian brings his fists down onto the kitchen island, the mugs jumping an inch up at the impact of Brian’s force. “Jae, fuck, how could I have done that? How could I have killed my own fucking _uncle_ like that?”

“Brian,” Jae sighs noisily. “I told you already. It was self-defence. He had a knife to your throat, right there, and you wanted to let him kill you like that?”

“Jae, you don’t understand what it feels like, to kill anything and anyone, by just touching them.” Brian’s chest heaves with every word, as if it hurt to speak. “You don’t understand, because anything and anyone you touch comes alive, feels warm and bubbly and some sappy shit like that. You don’t understand, because you’re not me, you didn’t just kill your uncle, you didn’t just get away from murder and from ending up in fucking jail, you hear me?”

Brian cries hard, so hard he slumps to the floor. Jae crouches down and sits before Brian. He pats down on Brian’s shoulder, quiet, soothing. “Jae,” Brian sobs. “Be honest with me. Do you hate me?”

_Why would you think such a thing, Jae?_

Jae swallows his nerves. “Why would you think such a thing, Brian?” Jae whispers. 

_You did nothing wrong, hear me? Absolutely nothing. No one saw it coming. Not even myself. And what’s in the past, stays in the past._ “Brian,” Jae whispers. His fingers graze Brian’s cheeks, tangle in the hairs on the uncut sideburns curling around his ears. “I don’t, and could never, hate you, ever.”

“Jae,” Brian gulps. “I don’t deserve you. Why are you still here? You just saw me kill someone. Don’t you remember what I promised you months ago? When we first discovered our powers?”

Jae remembers it so well, so clear. He remembers Brian grinning at him, Brian’s glimmering eyes in the beaming sun. “I won’t ever hurt anyone,” he’d said. “I don’t know why I have these powers, but trust me when I say that I will never use them, ever.”

“I do,” Jae admits. “But that doesn’t change who you are, Brian. None of this changes who you are. You’re still Brian, my best friend, my companion, the one I lo-”

He cuts himself off, but not fast enough. Brian’s eyes widen in shock, his jaw going slack. “Y-you,” he stutters, shaking his head, “you love me?”

Jae hisses. “Welllll,” he drags, inwardly cursing himself. “I kinda wanted to save that for later, but, uh, surprise?”

Brian looks at Jae forlornly, as if looking at his friend for the first time. The knot in Jae’s gut tightens and tightens with every passing second, until Brian sobs and leans so close Jae almost feels his heartbeat in his toes. “Fuck, Jae. Why do you have to say this now?”

“Because I love you?” _It pains me to know that you’re putting the blame on yourself, when you don’t need to._

_I love you. I love you. I love you._

Their lips crash against each other, a collision unspeakable, a feeling so indescribable. Brian sobs into the kiss, and his salty tears mix with the sour tangle taste of their mouths, but Jae loves it. Loves it because he does. Loves it because it’s Brian.

“I love you, too,” Brian cries against their lips. “Jae, I love you. I’m so sorry-”

“-Talk about that later,” Jae whispers. He rearranges himself, and carefully slots himself onto Brian’s lap. His hands trace the pretty corners of Brian’s face, grinning before kissing him again. “Right now, I love you.”

The cycle breaks again. But as the police sirens in the distance near closer and closer, fate leaves their sides, takes the broken cycle in their hands, mends it, spins it. 

Perhaps, this will be the last time the cycle spins again.

-

_[ +one ]_

“Ughhhhh,” YoungK groans. “This chord progression sucks shit!”

Jae spares the bassist a glance and snorts. “Ran out of inspiration, Mr Composer?” he comments casually. He watches as YoungK slams his head against the keyboard, startling Wonpil awake from his nap with a yelp.

As the scene unfolds before him, Sungjin sighs and looks at the clock. “11p.m.,” he announces. “Guess we’ll be stuck here for a while. I’ll go get us some snacks.”

“I’ll come, too!” Wonpil perks up, even though he’d just woken up.

Dowoon realises his golden opportunity to escape the damned four walls of the band room, and hurries to tag along. “Me three!” he says, and Sungjin, who has never said ‘no’ to the drummer before, rolls his eyes and drags the two of them out of the band room. The door clicks shut, leaving Jae and YoungK alone in the room. 

Jae glances up from the fretboard to look at YoungK. He’s sat slumped in his chair, staring at the score, deep in thought. “Maybe if you took a break, inspiration will hit again,” Jae suggests.

YoungK peers at Jae, the way he’s sat lazily on the floor, the way his jean jacket falls past his shoulder, revealing the smooth skin of his collarbone. “Yeah, no,” he quips, before returning his attention to the messy papers in his hands. “I’m cool.”

“Come ooooonnn,” Jae groans, before suddenly hissing in pain. Concerned, YoungK drops his papers and sets Goldie against the stand, before rushing over to Jae. Jae clutches his head as it throbs in pain. 

_Brian, c’mon, you’re going to get a cold._

“Migraine, again?” YoungK asks. The both of them have been having recurring headaches recently, images flashing before their eyes before vanishing into thin air. When the others had first found out, they’d joked about it, called it a soulmate thing. After realising how intense and frequent the headaches came about, though, they’d grown more and more worried for the two of them.

“Maybe y’all are working yourselves too hard,” Dowoon said.

“Or maybe y’all are practising wayyyy too late at night,” Sungjin pointed out. “Jae, don’t think I didn’t see you tweet at 4am last week.”

Jae groans, his hand sliding down his face. “Seriously, I don’t get why we get these weird visions and shit,” Jae mutters.

YoungK settles down on the empty spot beside Jae. “What was it about this time?” he asks gently.

Jae looks at YoungK. “We’re somewhere in the rain, in an alley,” he says slowly. “I tell you to get going, or you’ll get a cold. You’re crying, I think.”

YoungK blinks. “Never got that one before.”

Jae shrugs. He glances down at his guitar, then back at YoungK. “Hey, random question, but do you believe in fate?”

“What?” YoungK furrows his eyebrows. “Fate?”

“Yeah.” Jae nods. “Like, destiny or some shit.”

“Why do you ask?”

Jae smiles. Behind his glasses, his eyes gleam under the bright lights of the band room. “Remember when we first met backstage? How I hated you so much, thinking you were a hypocritical son of a bitch? How I ended up with you later on? That, my friend, is what I call fate.”

YoungK cackles, and Jae jumps, because sometimes the guy laughs like he’s on steroids. “You call that fate? I call that a coincidence.”

Jae rolls his eyes. “No wonder we never agreed on anything back then.”

“Still don’t.” Youngk sticks his tongue out at Jae, and whilst it’s childish, Jae does it back at him.

Jae sighs. “On a more serious note, don’t get so worked up over this, alright? Yes, the deadline date we set is nearing, but at this rate, you’re gonna get white hairs before you turn 30, bro.”

White shirt, white pants, white shoes. White hair.

YoungK grimaces, his face contorting in pain. Alarmed, Jae takes YoungK by the shoulders and looks at him square in the eye. “Hey, Bri, it’s just a vision,” Jae says. He watches on nervously as YoungK brings a hand to his forehead, groaning in pain.

_It means that, well, I feel this warm feeling in my chest when I see you._

As the headache fades with time, YoungK wrenches his eyes open, hadn’t realised that he’d shut them in the first place. Jae gulps down the clog stuck in his throat. “What was it about, this one?”

YoungK coughs. “The… the one with you, and your white hair. And… I’m telling you about a warm feeling in my chest… when I see you.”

To YoungK’s surprise, Jae barks with laughter. “Gosh, sorry, I just…” he chuckles. “I can’t imagine you saying that.”

YoungK narrows his eyes at Jae. “And what if I did?” he asks defiantly.

Jae crosses his arms over his chest. “It wouldn’t be genuine,” he says. “Because you don’t like me, duh.”

YoungK’s eyes slide down from Jae’s frazzled hair, his eyes, his nose, his full lips. The warmth in his chest he’d been stamping down on for forever breaks like a dam, spilling outwards past the cage of his chest. “Jae,” he swallows. “I’m going to be serious.”

Realising how grim YoungK’s tone is, Jae stops fooling around. He notices how YoungK’s sharp eyes seem to burn a hole in him. “Uh, okay?” he offers.

YoungK sighs. “Look, this probably isn’t the right time or place to tell you this, but…” _Since when were words this difficult?_ he wonders. “You give me strength. When you came into the band with your guitar and your vocals and annoyingly good looks, I was so mad, so, so mad that you were chosen to be the guitarist, and I was forced to the bass.”

“Oh, yeah, that,” Jae smiles sheepishly. “Man, that felt like yesterday.”

“Thing is, you gave me strength to work harder,” YoungK continues. “You gave me strength when our band was absolutely invisible, unknown to everyone. You give me strength when I tear up the score sheets and throw the stands to the floor. You give me strength when I cry myself to sleep sometimes. You give me strength when I’m on the verge of breaking down. You give me strength when you light up my day with your stupid jokes and weird sense of humour, and you always have.”

He stops short, and looks at Jae. Right now, five different versions of Jae blip over his vision. Jae sucks in a sharp breath as he looks at YoungK, stares at the five different versions of YoungK blinking back at him, for a moment, before all that’s left is his friend. His best friend. His bandmate. His love.

Kang Younghyun, Brian Kang, YoungK. 

Jae grins. _That’s ‘cause you’re my lucky charm, too._ “I know this is gonna sound craaaaazy,” Jae begins. “But i feel that way too. You give me strength, too.”

YoungK fights back a smile. _I really like you. All of you._ “Glad we feel the same way?”  
Jae laughs. _I’m lucky enough to be able to tell you this after all this time._ “Same here,” he replies, already pulling YoungK closer with a tug of his sleeve.

 _It hurts to see you sad, and it makes me glad when you’re smiling._ “Jae… What’re you doing?” YoungK mutters, his heartbeat hitting the roof with how Jae’s full lips ghost over his own.

_Right now, I love you._

“I’m going to kiss you, you dumbass.”

“Oh!” YoungK laughs. _I love you._ “Sure.” _I love you._ “Absolutely.” _I love you._

And when they kiss, it’s better than any kind of love song ever written, any kind of art ever drawn, any kind of story ever written. It’s a spark that ruptures into an explosion that rips the skies apart, or at least in Jae and YoungK’s world. Their lips meet soft, slow, hesitant, as they sit there on the floor of the band room, hair greasy, glasses pressed against YoungK’s face, lips sliding over each other carelessly, recklessly, without a damn in this world. And when they part, the cycle breaks, once and for all. And fate ties them together, right here, in this place and time, for as long as they’ll have each other. 

**Author's Note:**

> [twitter](https://twitter.com/sideofstew) // [curious cat](https://curiouscat.qa/softtofustew) // [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/softtofustew)


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